Some hours later, Roubani is lying in a Sickbay bed in one of those infernal paper gown things. Under blankets, of course, for modesty and all. He picks idly at his cuticles with his fingernails, having little else to do.

And in through the door walks a now fully-dressed Thea Legacy. She's in her sweats and tanks, clearly off duty. In one arm, she's carrying an armload of books and files. In the other, what appears to be a game box, locked shut. The staff, of course, let her in and she heads right for Roubani's bed, smile firmly in place. "Well, you'd never guess how easy it was to find a pen in your rack, Ensign Roubani," she comments with quiet cheer.

Roubani's eyes come up, sleepy but focused now. He rests his hands down on his chest as Legacy gets closer, lines of worry obvious on his face. "Sir. I'm so sorry."

"Thea or Black Cat or Cat," she reminds him with a quirked brow. "I've got your notes, if you need them. I grabbed the top files. Here's your pen on top. I've got a couple books and the travel chess board. I wasn't sure how long you'd be here." Everything is put neatly on a nearby table. Once her hands are free, she turns back to him and holds out his pen. "There's nothing for you to apologize for, Poet. Is everything alright?"

"Thank you." Roubani glances at the table, careful not move his head. It still aches like a bitch. He picks at the collar of the paper gown, frowning at his fingers. "I'm alright." Pick, pick. "Do they have to tell Major Vendas and Captain Marek?"

She continues to hold his pen out to him, standing next to the bed, and a simple nod probably confirms his worst fears. "They need to be notified why one of their pilots was pulled off CAP," she says quietly. "Illness is a valid excuse, and I dare say not much will be said." Then the smile fades from Cat's lips. "However."

"I'm not ill." Roubani insists. He sounds faintly mortified at all this, and looks back at Thea's face with tension in his expression. "However…?"

Pike arrives from the Sickbay - Deck 2.
Pike has arrived.

It's a couple hours later and Thea's now dressed in her sweats as she comes to visit Roubani. There are files on the table, a travel chess game, and she's standing next to his bed holding a pen out to the man in it. "You're concussed," she says simply. "That means you're ill. The however is that I expect you, the next time you even so much as sit back hard in your seat, to report to medical. What would have happened if you'd gone up on CAP feeling the way you did, Roubani?" No, it's not Poet right now. Just a hint of Captain is in her voice.

Roubani exhales tensely, glancing away from her. His lips purse into a thin line. "Yes, sir. I thought it was just something normal. Or…I don't know, the gods punishing me for not flying as well as I should have."

"The Gods would've had you stumble into my door, I do believe," Pike says as she enters, a lab coat over her fatigues. "How's your dizziness since we brought you in?"

Thea finally gets the hint and puts the pen down on the table, stepping aside slightly. "When you hit your head, it's not normal Poet," she says quietly. "Do you think the gods were punishing me for going into a bar by having one of my own coworkers shoot me in the ass?"

Roubani only notices the pen then, glancing at it. "No. You weren't supposed to be doing your job in a bar." The corners of his mouth are still tensed into a frown when he hears Pike's voice. Only his eyes move, sparing his head. "Better, sir, thank you."

Pike nods approvingly. "Good that your restricting your head movement. Though next time you take a headbump I want you in here even if you think you escaped unscathed. I'm not being overly cautious here, you get concussed once, it invites reinjury."

Thea settles in the chair near Roubani's bed. Apparently she's got no plans to go anywhere anytime soon. "That's what he and I were discussing, Sir," she says quietly. "I believe he was about to tell me that, the next time he tries to hit something with his head, he'll take a swing by here on the way home. He's a bit concerned about the CAG and his Captain knowing. I assured him they'd need to know because one of the pilots was pulled from the line."

Reinjury? Oh, great. Roubani picks at a cuticle again. "Yes, sir," he mutters to Pike. "How long do I have to stay here?" His eyes go back to Thea, then Pike again.

Pike crosses her arms. "Overnight for observation, then 72 hours light duty, then a re-exam to make sure you're okay to return to the cockpit." She looks to Thea. "I trust you'll have no problem making sure he sticks to that, Captain?"

"I'm only here as a friend, Major," Thea tells Pike, looking up at the other woman. "But I think Poet understands the theory behind what has to be done." Not quite an answer, was it? She looks back to Roubani, expression gently encouraging.

"It's not a problem, sir." Bravado? Not in this particular Ensign. Roubani looks more embarassed at this whole thing than anything else. "I'm really sorry. I thought it would just go away."

Pike nods and smiles. "General Medicine 101. Pain, discomfort, and/or disorientation are usually a sign of a much larger root cause. I'm not trying to browbeat you here. The health of everyone on this boat is my foremost concern. I just want to make sure you're a hundred percent the next time you hop behind the stick."

Thea settles in to listen, relaxed and comfortable. Well, as comfortable as one can be in a plastic chair with a Major standing in front of her and a man wearing a paper gown in the bed next to her.

Said paper gown is thankfully covered under blankets. All the way to the chest. Roubani doesn't nod, instead just giving the verbal, "Yes, sir. Thank you."

Pike nods to Roubani, then says to Thea, "Captain, you're free to stay as long as you like, just as long as he gets a good night's sleep tonight. If either of you need anything, I'm on duty here for another few hours and the corpsmen can track me down afterwards."

Legacy dips her head to Pike, smiling a bit. "Thank you, Major," she says quietly. "I'll try not to stay too long so the Ensign can get the sleep he needs." It's the simple things, really.

Roubani examines the top part of his blanket while his superiors talk over him. How awkward.

Pike quirks an eyebrow as Thea gives her assurances. "Ummm… Captain, are you all right?"

Legacy's eyes go a little wide as she looks up at Pike then over to Roubani, as if she's afraid of what -he's- going to say. "I'm fine, Major," she says after a moment, looking back up to Pike. "I'll be seeing you in a couple days."

Pike blinks and looks between the two of them, then simply nods. "Couple days. Right." Looking a bit like the elephant in the room, he politely excuses herself, backing into sickbay proper.

Pike heads through the exit labeled <SB> Sickbay.
Pike has left.

The Captain settles back in her seat, watching the Major for a moment. "Well. That was awkward."

Roubani slides his hands under the blankets, hiding them and his arms. The tattoo on his forearm disappears under the material and he folds his covered arms atop his chest. "She meant well."

"Everyone does," she says with a little smile, then glances over to him. For a moment, her lips purse, and then she asks, simply, "Who hurt you to the point you can't stand being touched?"

Roubani's aching head registers the shift in gears and he blinks. One hand snakes back out from under the covers and he scratches his cheek over the bone. The edge of his blanket's interesting again. "Don't you have things you just don't like?"

"Idiots, mainly," she replies, tone going a little dry again. "But I'm terrified of the dark. Absolutely, stark raving terrified of the dark. My bird got shot down by friendly fire on an op. It blew. SAR did a flyby and reported that I was KIA. I spent the next three days after I ejected sleeping in caves with a severe concussion and a broken arm and trying to get through the forest." A shoulder lifts delicately. "So now, whenever there's pitch black, I have panic attacks."

Roubani looks back at her somewhere in the middle of all that. "That's very heroic," he says, softly. "What did they do when you got back?"

She blinks at him, head tilting to the side. "There's not a frakking thing heroic about self-preservation, Poet. Don't let anyone fool you about that. The survival instinct is a very strong thing. Farmers found me and took me to the nearest base. I felt like a keyring that had 'if found, please return to…' on it." She DOES grin a little at that, but her hands are folded in her lap, tightly. "I was hospitalized for a week, grounded for seven while my arm healed. Then I got back to work."

Eddie arrives from the Sickbay - Deck 2.
Eddie has arrived.

"Not everyone has survival instinct, sir," Roubani says, keeping his voice quiet. "Some people just…give up. You didn't. I think it's very admirable of you." He's in a bed in a quiet area, Legacy in a chair nearby. On the rolling table the Captain's put some books, a notebook, and a travel chess set in a box. And a pen.

Legacy is seated in her chair, hands clamped together in her lap. "You'd be surprised what happens when you're out of your mind with pain," she says quietly. "Of course, we weren't just talking about me." Her tone is gentle and quiet, expression somewhat intent as she watches the young man in the bed.

Eddie pushes through the recovery ward doors like her ass is on fire and she can't find a tub of water to sit in. Her flight suit has been stripped down to her waist and she has that fresh off CAP smell. Instead of tank tops, she has a long sleeve t-shirt, sleeves pulled down tight to her wrists. Quicky, she starts searching each bay until she finds the one Roubani is tucked to. "A concussion? What the frak." Like it's his fault. And never mind the Captain sitting there, Eddie doesn't realize /that/ fact until too late. Even if Pike told her, she was deaf to anything but her fellow Ensign's condition.

Thea looks like she's going to argue with Roubani, but then the other female pilot comes flying in. The Captain smiles a little and rolls to her feet. "I'll be back in the morning, Poet," she says quietly. "Evening, Mooner."

Eddie straightens up sharply when Legacy speaks. "Sorry sir." Eddie says briskly, "I didn't see you there." But she seems to relax when she realizes Legacy isn't going to rip her a new one for her language or possibly aggitating a patient. With far more hesitancy then she showed barging in here, Eddie moves around the corner of Roubani's bed, and taps her fingers near his hand. "Was just parking my bird when a techie said you passed out in the Head. Then the doc says you have a concussion. That's not /fine/." Eddie seems aggitated about all of this, and just being in sickbay seems to make her nervous. "I'm sorry, you don't have to leave on my account." She realizes that Legacy is taking her leave.

Roubani's hand is under the covers. All of the exposed parts of his arms are, folded loosely over his chest beneath the blankets. "Goodnight, sir," he tells Thea, then his forehead crinkles when he hears of how Eddie heard about this and his expression tightens into a frown. His eyes turn to the ceiling. "I flew badly and this is what happened. It's my fault."

Legacy shakes her head to Eddie, lips thinning slightly as she hears what Roubani has to say. The already tired woman suddenly looks exhausted. Without a word, she simply nods to the pair then turns to slip out.

Well. Eddie tapped in the vague proximity of Roubani's hand. Or Elbow. Or something equally unobtrusive in greeting. And now she's just silent as Legacy slips out, beyond just another quiet, "Sir." In parting.

Roubani catches the look on Legacy's face and sighs quietly. "Sorry…" Just messing up left and right today. He falls silent, uncovering a hand to rub a thumb over his cheek.

Legacy heads through the exit labeled <SB> Sickbay.
Legacy has left.

Eddie moves around to take up the chair that Legacy occupied. "That's the best you got? Shit, if you're going to say you screwed up and take blame for shit that just /happens/, at least do something more spectacular." She flops into the chair, sinking down in it like the adrenaline from rushing up here is quickly wearing off. "I dunno. Like. Something that'll give you more scars. Girls think they're sexy. What the frak, man. You're really blaming yourself for bad flying? If it was really bad flying, you'd'a been smeared all over the side of the Kharon." Eddie's thought process is all over the place.

"It could have been worse, yes," Roubani's eyes are half-lidded as he delivers this gem of pragmatic thought. His head still aches. He's silent for a few seconds, then muses at her, "Do you ever listen to all of them talk? The Lieutenants and Captains. All their stories about how when they were barely rookies, they miraculously landed with no gear…or saved all these people, or did this hotshot thing or that ace manuever." He pauses, wryly raising an eyebrow at her. "Do you ever wonder if just maybe…you're not up to par?"

Eddie pushes up out of her slouch for that, leaning forward to answer. "And does it every occur to you, that maybe they're just full of shit? Like a promotion comes with a free pass to forget all the mistakes you made when you were fresh out of flight school too. It's like those fishing stories…I once hooked a fish /this/ big." She holds out her hands to demonstrate, "When all they actually did was pass out in the boat after drinking beer and got a righteous sunburn."

Roubani's lip tugs up for a second. Kind of a smile. Then it fades and he repeats quietly, "Do you ever wonder it?"

Eddie lays her hand on his bed again, but just near the rail. It's clear she wants to touch him, and comfort, but is refraining. "Everyone wonders it. But I've /seen/ you fly. I'd strap my ass to the nose of your bird and let you slalom asteroids, without hesitation."

Roubani chuckles under his breath. "I wouldn't." He licks his dry lips, running his tongue over the corner where the skin's a little cracked. "The CAG had to turn her own bird around and shoot a bandit off me. After it had already taken most of my wing off. Stabiliser too. I didn't even scratch it."

Eddie steeples her hands together, leaning over them she presses her lips to her forefingers and stays up tight against the side of his bed. Her voice comes as a mumble, "Our first engagement, I barely scraped the paint on one of those frakkers. It happens. To all ov us. I should have been out there yesterday with you. But it was my day off, and when condition one sounded.." She shakes her head. Needless to say she was in no shape to fly. "I heard back you got back alright, and didn't think anything of it. I'm glad you're okay."

"I'm glad you didn't go," Roubani says, wryly. He pulls a hand out from under the covers and rubs his eye, then his temple. "Did you have a good day off, at least?"

Eddie smirks a bit, turning her lips devilishly. "Why, because then both of us would be laid up in here?" At his question though, the smirk drifts away, lips flattening out. She just shakes her head in the negative for an answer.

Roubani hadn't expected a negative. He slips his hand back under the covers, bunching the blanket up comfortably at his chest. "Do you want to talk about it?"

Eddie exhales slowly, her breath without the usual tint of cigarettes lingering in it. She came up straight from CAP without a smoke break, but if she's jonesing, it's not showing. Yet. "Some people just can't be trusted. I…um." She tugs at the cuffs of her shirt further down on her wrists. "Made a mistake. That's all."

"It happens." Roubani doesn't nod, not chancing moving his head. His tone, though, seems to understand. "I'm sorry you had a bad day. One thing can really ruin everything."

Eddie pulls a hand down her face, straightening up from her lean towards his bed slightly. "You'd think I'd know better by now." She's quiet a moment, head tilted so she's no longer looking directly at him. "One thing can really ruin everything." She repeats at a murmur. "Did I seriously frak everything up between us?" She asks tentatively.

"No." Roubani raises an eyebrow, continuing drily, "I know myself. I would be avoiding you for all I was worth if you had."

Eddie oozes back into the chair, slinging one leg up over the plastic arm of it, her flightsuit crackling with the effort. "That's not terribly reassuring."

Roubani sighs quietly. "I don't know what else I can say."

Eddie toys with her dogtags, letting silence fall between them. There /is/ nothing else to say, apparently. At least not on that subject. Hell, she was avoiding /him/ before he ended up laid up in here. Finally, "You should pretend to have a sore throat. They give you ice cream." Sickbay wisdom, from one pilot to another.

"Do they…" Roubani's tone softens. Clearly ice cream is a good thought. "Did they have good ice cream on Caprica?"

Strange how many of their conversations come back to ice cream. Maybe that's safe ground. "My favorite was the coffee flavor at this little place just around the corner from my old apartment. Like combining two vices in one. If they could ever take nicotine and make it into an ice cream that actually tasted good, they'd have a mint." Eddie cracks a smile again, faintly. "But they only have plain vanilla in places like this."

Fenris arrives from the Sickbay - Deck 2.
Fenris has arrived.

Roubani smiles a little, wrinkling his nose at the same time. "Nicotine ice cream…that's awful." He's lying in bed, as medical is making him do for the night, the covers pulled up over his arms and chest. Eddie's sitting beside him. "I've never had that…ice cream with coffee in it." Yes, deep conversation going on here.

Eddie is half sprawled into the chair that's at Roubani's bedside, one leg slung up over the plastic arm of it. "I miss the ice cream. I don't miss the fifth story walk up, where my bathtub was in my kitchen."

Fenris sticks her head in the door, pausing thus just inside as she ventures, "Is this a bad time?" She look to Morales, then Roubani, straightening some in the doorway, but, waiting for an answer, regardless.

"You lived in one of those too?" Roubani's voice is kept very quiet. Too much vibration equals headache made worse. He can't see the door well past Eddie's head, so he has to go on sound. "…Lieutenant Valasche?"

Eddie glances to Roubani, and then to the door. "Nah. I can split. Gotta be nice and share." With a groan like an audible protest at moving limbs, Eddie pours herself out of the seat. Her knuckles knock against the frame of Roubani's bed, like a sign of affection with her parting where some might give hugs.

"Yes." Fen confirms Roubani's guess, though, with Eddie's rise, she adds, "I wanted to see that you were alright, not wedge in on friends." She turns slightly so she can go or stay on the next words given, though her eyes remain on the pair.

Eddie manages a smile, though for who's benefit remains to be seen. "No wedge. I'm itching for a smoke anyways. Surprised I'm not already crawling up the wall." She tells Fen, then turns back to Roubani. "Get some rest, Rubix." She nods then to Fenris, "Sir." Before slipping out into the hall.

Eddie heads through the exit labeled <SB> Sickbay.
Eddie has left.

Fen steps aside for Eddie's departure with a little nod, then enters the room proper. "I'm not certain, things were chaotic when I was in here." As the Lt. draws up beside his cot she asks, "How do you feel?"

"Alright, sir." Roubani talks quietly. Something in his tone is a little ashamed as she looks at him. "It's just…a minor incident."

"A minor incident wouldn't bother you so much." Fenris replies, then, "I didn't come to lecture you. I wanted to be sure you were alright, but I'm not convinced you are. What's wrong?"

"Nothing, sir." Roubani raises his eyes back up, to her face. "How are you? I'm sure coming back down here isn't exactly the most pleasant thing in the universe."

"My original purpose in being here was for reinstatement. The last I'd heard after the engagement, you were fine." Fen bows her head a bit, "It was only as Ensign Morales inquired about you that I got wind that something was wrong."

Roubani shrugs one shoulder, looking down. "They said sometimes things don't show up right away." He picks some imagined piece of lint off the edge of the blanket on his chest. "Please don't mention it to anyone else. In the squadron."

Fenris considers Roubani for a moment, "Everyone gets hurt, Poet. We're going to be taking hits, adjusting tactics and learning as we go. That everyone came home from a lopsided engagement alive says something for the parties involved." A beat, then, "Am I a bad pilot?"

Roubani looks back up at her, his expression unreadable. "No, sir."

"Do you know why I asked?" Fenris wonders dryly.

How do you answer that without sounding like a smartass? Roubani clears his throat softly. "Probably not, sir."

"You came out of an engagement with a concussion that wasn't imediately apparant." Fenris answers without heart, "I was carried out of my Viper. Injuries will happen to us all. There is no shame in them."

"Sir, with all due respect, we're nothing alike." Roubani keeps his eyes on her. "You are so good at what you do that you teach the squadron to be you. When someone like you is carried out of your Viper, it's because without your being out there, the entire outcome of the engagement probably would have been different. I'm here because I couldn't even scratch paint. And my incompetance nearly ruined a Viper. There is shame in that, sir."

Fenris looks a little surprised. Then again, her people skills… "Then we'll work on your gunnery." She turns, some, "Rather than upset you further, would you like me to retrieve something for you?"